USA > Maryland > An historical view of the government of Maryland : from its colonization to the present day > Part 26
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The first act which they passed, was, " the act of recognition of William and Mary ;" and the second, "an act for the service The church of of Almighty God, and the establishment of the Pro- England esta- blished by law. testant religion in this province." By the latter, the Church of England was formally established ; provision made for dividing all the counties into parishes, and the election of ves- try men for each, for the conservation of the church interests ; and a poll tax of forty pounds of tobacco, imposed upon every taxable of the province, to build churches and sustain their mi- nisters. Thus was introduced, for the first time in Maryland, a church establishment, sustained by law, and fed by general taxation.
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Under the gentle auspices of that government, whose tyranni- cal and Popish inclinations were now the favorite theme, the Its establish- profession and exercise of the Christian religion, in ment a vorelty all its modes, was open to all-no church was esta-
in the history of
the province. blished : all were protected-none were taxed to sustain a church, to whose tenets they were opposed : and the people gave freely as a benevolence, what they would have loathed as a tax. Perhaps this was not entirely owing to the spirit of toleration. The fallen and corrupt nature of man is ever warring against this spirit ; and it requires all the efforts of reason, and the injunctions of the gospel, to retain us in steady obe- dience to its gentle dictates. In the midst of sorrow and suffer- ing, to forgive our oppressors, is an effort to which human nature
(12) Upper House Proceedings, 10th May, 1692. Liber FF, 595.
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is seldom equal : yet even this does not so task the purity and benignity of the heart, as the hour of power and triumph. Of all the sects and parties which have ever divided men, how fon are there, who, in that hour, beholding their adversaries prostrate at their feet, have wholly forgiven the injuries of the past, or have stooped to assuage their sorrows, and to win them from their errors by the language of kindness and persuasion. The proprietary dominion had never known that hour. The Pro- testant religion was the established religion of the mother coun- try : and any efforts, on the part of the proprietaries, to oppress its followers, would have drawn down destruction upon their own government. The great body of the colonists were themselves Protestants : and, by their numbers, and their participation in the legislative power, they were fully equal to their own protection, and too powerful for the proprietaries, in the event of an open collision. The safety of the latter was therefore identified with a system of religious toleration. But by the revolution, the go- vernment was placed in a very different condition. The people of the colony were principally Protestants : and both here and in the mother country, they had just emerged from a struggle commenced, and avowedly prosecuted for the defence of their religion, and terminating in complete triumph. With all the power, persuasions, and excitement of the moment, to tempt them to the measure, they yielded to the temptation. The Church of England was established by law : and from the passage of this act of 1692, until the American revolution, it continued to be the established church of the colony.
Such exclusive establishments are like all-devouring death. They are ever crying for "more." Their first aim is to establish Consequences of themselves: and their next to oppress all others. establish- The usual consequences soon followed. It was not enough to have the power of the laws, and its intrinsic me- rits to sustain itself: it must have penalties to awe into silence all who might obstruct its universal sway. Hence the act of 1204, chap. 59, entitled " An act to prevent the growth of Popery within the province." Under this act, all bishops or priests of the Catholic church, were inhibited, by severe penalties, from saying mass, or exercising the spiritual functions of their office, or en- deavoring, in any manner, to persuade the inhabitants of the pro-
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vince to become reconciled to the church of Rome: Catholics, generally, were prohibited from engaging in the instruction of youths : and power was given to the Protestant children of Papists, to compel their parents to furnish them a maintenance adequate to their condition in life. At the same session, how- ever, an act was passed, suspending the operation of these penal- ties, as to priests exercising their spiritual functions in private families of the Catholic persuasion : and this exemption was kept up throughout this era, by succeeding acts. (13)
The course pursued as to the Protestant dissenters, exhibited more toleration. For some years after the revolution, the Quak- ers were regarded by the Protestants of the established church Condition of the with almost as much aversion as the Catholics. The senters under the pacific tenets of this sect, and its peculiarly simple Protestant Dis- new govern- ment. forms of worship, were still mistaken for disaffection to the government: and to the devotees of the newly established church, nonconformity to its rites and doctrines was a crime in Protestant or Catholic. In their understanding, the Protestant church was nothing more or less than the Church of England ; and like all exclusives, in the first moments of power, they acted upon the doctrine, " He that is not with us, is against us." The Quak- ers were persecuted : and even the calmness and silence of their conventicles, where disorder itself might be softened into con- templation, could not exempt them from the appellation of un- lawful assemblages. In England, the course of the government was more conformable to the avowed purposes of the Protestant revolution. One of its first acts, after the elevation of William
(13) Acts of 1704, chap. 95 ; and 1706, chap. 9th, which gave place to the act of 1707, chap. Gth, suspending all prosecutions in such excepted cases, during the Queen's pleasure. It appears from the recitals of this act, that this suspension was at the instance of the crown. At length, in 1718, this act of 1707 was repealed by the act of 1713, chap. 4th : which last men- tioned act assigns as the reason for the repeal, the existence of the English statute 11th and 12th William 3d, chap. 4th. By this statute, says the pre- amble to this repealing act, sufficient provision is made to prevent the growth of Popery in this province, as throughout all others, his Majesty's dominions ; and as an act of Assembly can in no way alter the effect of that statute, Be it therefore enacted, &c. This admission of the supremacy of the legislative power of Parliament in matters of internal regulation, is a novelty in the le- gislative records of Maryland.
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and Mary to the English throne, extended toleration to all Pro- testant dissenters. It was a measure of policy as well as jus- tice : for it behoved William to strengthen himself upon his newly acquired throne, by rallying around it the affections of all his Protestant subjects. This policy at length prevailed in Ma- ryland. In 1702, the provisions of the English toleration act were expressly extended to the Protestants of the province : and the Quakers of the province were declared to be enti- tled to the benefit of the act of 7th William, 3d. permitting their affirmation to be received instead of an oath in certain cases. (14) Prosecutions having been subsequently instituted for holding Quaker conventicles, and some doubt having arisen as to the operation of the toleration act, it was again express- ly adopted in 1706, as a part of the laws of the province. (15) Thus the toleration of the Protestant dissenters was fully and finally secured; and thus in a colony, which was established by Catholics, and grew up to power and happiness under the gov- ernment of a Catholic, the Catholic inhabitant was the only victim of religious intolerance.
The next aim of the Assembly was at the proprietary rights and revenues, which were not incident to the government of the province, and were not, therefore, swallowed up by the revolu- tion. The rights of the proprietary, under the charter, have al- ready been distributed into two general classes, one of which
Proprietary embraced his rights of jurisdiction, and the other rights and inter- esti tiot affected his rights of soil as the original owner of the lands
. by the revolu- tion. of the province. The latter, being rights private and personal in their nature and emoluments, were not, of course, destroyed by a mere revolution in the government. The proprie- tary was still entitled to his quit-rents and alienation fines, and
(14) Act of 1702, ch. 1, sec. 21st. This act adopts the provisions of the toler- ation acts, with the modification, that all things required by them to be done before any court, or justice, or justices of the peace, should be done before the respective county courts ; and that the registry of the places used for re- ligiouy worship by the Protestant dissenters, should be made amongst the re- cords of the county court.
(15) Assembly Proceedings of 1706, and act of 1706, chap. Sth. This act expressly adopts the toleration act of Ist William and Mary, with all the penal acts mentioned therein. The introduction of these recited penal acts ap- pears to have been the principal object of this law of 1706.
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was still the exclusive owner of the vacant lands. Besides these, he enjoyed revenues, arising from the port duty and the tobacco duty; the origin and extent of which have already been ex- amined. Of these he claimed, as private and personal, all arising from the port duty, and the one half of that arising from the tobacco duty. (16) He had also, whilst he held the government, enjoyed personally the revenue arising from fines and amercements. The land office was closed on the 18th of April, 1689, the period when the revolutionary struggle be- gan, and was not again opened until the 23d May, 1694, when the contest about his land rights was terminated. But pending, and immediately after the revolution, Lord Baltimore asserted . his claim to the revenues arising from the sources above men- tioned, and instructed his agents to proceed in the collection of them.
In this he was sustained by the crown. Whatever William's policy as to the disposition of the government, he yet did not
These private. lose sight of justice, in his proceedings as to the
and personal rights sustained mere private rights of the proprietary. His course, by the crown. as to these, reflects honor upon his character; and ' clearly evidences, that the conduct of the proprietary, during the revolution in England, had not been such as to forfeit all claims to his favor. In February, 1689, even before the revolution com- menced in the province, he received a royal letter, authorising him to collect his revenues and duties in Maryland; and after the consummation of the revolution, in February, 1690, an order was passed by the king in council, giving him the same general liberty. The leaders of the revolution obeyed the king's injunc- tions, when it answered their own purposes; but on this occa- sion, they chose to disregard them. The proprietary's agents werc thrown into prison, and harassed in every manner, so that they were unable to avail themselves of the liberty granted : and Baltimore was again compelled to apply to the king for protec- tion. A letter of instruction was now given by the crown to sir Lionel Copley, who was just about to assume the government of the province, enjoining it upon him to take care that the agents of. Lord Baltimore " were permitted to live peaceably and qui- etly, and to act as formerly in receiving his dues and revenues in
(16) Supra, 176 and 178.
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the province; and that no vessels should be cleared from it until they had paid their shipping dues." (17)
All would not suffice. Mr. Darnall, the proprietary's agent and receiver general, still encountering the same difficulties, at Ultimate dispo- the session of May, 1692, he preferred a petition to sition of these
rights. the governor and council, praying that some order might be passed to insure him the liberty granted by the king's · letter of 1691. In this petition, he requested that all the bonds, records, and other documents, relative to his lordship's rents and lands, might be delivered to him; that he might be permitted to take possession of the proprietary's houses and plantations, and particularly those of Mattapany and Notley Hall; and that the governor would designate ports of clearance, at which he might appoint agents to receive the shipping dues. (18) The subject of this petition was referred to the lower house. That house de- termined, that the port duty of 14d. per ton was, in its origin, a fort duty, given to the proprietary for building magazines and purchasing munitions of war for the defence of the province ; and that as such, it belonged to the public; and that as to the tobacco duty, which was originally given under an agreement with the proprietary as to his fines and quit-rents, it should still be continued, if the proprietary would adhere to this agreement, and would also continue his conditions of plantation, as they ex- isted before the revolution, or as they then existed in Virginia ; so that vacant lands of the province might still be obtained upon favorable terms. To the fines and amercements accruing after the revolution, it wholly denied his right; and as to the records and papers relative to his lands, it decided that all of these might be surrendered, except the certificates of survey and land records proper; which, as the only evidences of land titles, should be re- tained, and placed in the custody of the secretary of the pro- vince. This decision was concurred in by the upper house; and in conformity to it, an order was passed by the Assembly, prohibiting Lord Baltimore's agents from collecting the port duty, which was directed to be collected by the agents of the go- vernment, and placed in bank, to await the king's determination.
(17) This letter of 12th November, 1691, in its recitals, sustains the state- ments above made as to the course of the crown.
(18) Council Proceedings, Liber FF, 641.
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(19) Thus asserting the right of the province to the tonnage duty, the Assembly now passed an act directing its appropria- tion for the support of government; (20) by the passage of which, the subject was brought directly before the king in coun- cil. It was there determined, in conformity to the opinion of the solicitor general, that the proprietary was entitled, in his own right, to the tonnage duty of 14d. per ton, and to the one half of the two shillings per hogshead duty on tobacco; but that as to the fines and forfeitures, they were incident to the government, and passed with it to the crown. (21) The act was therefore dis- sented from ; and from this period until his restoration, the pro- prietary does not appear to have been interrupted in the collec- tion and enjoyment. of these revenues.
Some further difficulties still occurred as to his land rights. Sir Thomas Lawrence, the secretary of the province, in whose custody the land records were placed, would not permit Lord Baltimore's agent, to resort to the records, and Adjustment and condition the proprietary's , of make searches and extracts from them, except upon Land Rights dur- the payment of his fees of office. Without detail- ing this era. ing the various proceedings connected with this controversy, it will suffice to say, that after having reached the king in council, it was then terminated by agreement. The land records were to be kept in the custody of the secretary of the pro- vince. Warrants were to be issued, surveys made and returned, and patents granted, by the proprietary's officers. The patents were to be issued under the proprietary's seal, and recorded in the secretary's office. As the bonus of the compromise, one half of all the fees arising from issuing warrants and patents, and entering certificates of survey, was to be paid to the secretary ; and the agents of Lord Baltimore were allowed free access to the land records in the secretary's office, for the purpose of perfect- ing his rent roll. (22) This agreement was confirmed by the
(19) Council Proceedings, FF, 640 to 643, 661 and 670.
(20) Act of 1692, chap. 17.
(21) Council Proceedings of 2d October, 1623, and Bacon's note to the act of 1692, chap. 17, which sets out at large the proceedings of the king in council. .
(22) The proceedings connected with this controversy, may be traced in Upper House Proceedings, Liber FF, 750 to 753 ; 764, 775, and Liber HI D, part 2d, 347.
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king in council, on the 13th February, 1695, (old style,) but the rights of the proprietary were previously so far secured, that the land office was opened on the 23d of May, 1694. From that period, it remained open and under the direction of the proprie- tary, until the 15th of May, 1711; when it was closed in conse- quence of the death of Colonel Darnall, the agent and receiver general ; but was again opened on the 2d of March, 1712, (old style,) and remained open until the restoration. During this era, the proprietary encountered occasional difficulties in the collection of his rents; but this recognition and legal establish- ment of his rights in the manner above described, existed during the continuance of the royal government.
The old city of St. Mary's was the next victim of the revolution. Cooval with the colony itself, it had hitherto been the permanent seat of the provincial government. The original site of the colo- City of ft. Ma. ny, and, for some years after its establishment, the ty's. centre of the whole settlement, it soon attained to all its destined maturity. In a few years after the landing, it numbered sixty houses; and it scarcely ever exceeded that, at any after-period. The colony was now beginning to diffuse itself along the shores of the bay to the extremities of the pro- vince; and within thirty years after its first planting, this city was already a remote point on the southern extremities of the settle- ments. The commerce of the province, as unrestrained as its population, found its outlets at every point to which the latter extended ; and St. Mary's soon ceasing to be its commercial em- porium, became a mere landing place for the trade of its own im- mediate neighborhood. The habits and pursuits of the inhabi- tants, devoted as they were to planting, and relying for their sup- plies almost exclusively upon the parent country, left it without any other permanent population, than that which is necessarily incident to the site of a government. At a period when most of the facilities of travelling which we now enjoy were unknown, and the business of the government and courts centred to a much greater degree in the capital, than it does at this day, the re- moteness of its situation from the great body of the settlements, was a source of inconvenience and expense, always felt, and often complained of. Still the will of the proprietary, and the feelings of the people, all conspired to sustain the privileges of this ancient
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city; and as late as 1662, when the inconveniences of resort to it, were as sensibly felt as at any after-period, with a view to the permanent establishment of the legislature, an act was passed, authorising the purchase of land at St. Mary's, for the site of a state house ; and another in 1674, to defray the expense of its erection, under which it was actually built, at an expense, which shows, that it was a work of some taste and magnitude. (23) In the year 1671, the then town of St. Mary's received a new acces- sion to its consequence by its erection into a city, with the privi- lege of sending two delegates to the Assembly. Yet with all these advantages and expenditures, to give it permanency as the seat of government, the proprietary, in 1683, yielded to the wishes of the inhabitants, and removed the Assembly, the courts and the offices, to a place called the Ridge, in. Anne Arundel county, at which one session of the Assembly was then held. The want of the necessary accommodations soon drove them from that place ; and they were then removed to Battle creek on the Patuxent, where, after a session of three days, the provincial court, from the same cause found it necessary to adjourn. The seat of govern- ment was now brought back to St. Mary's ; and to encourage the inhabitants in its improvement, the proprietary then gave them a written assurance, that it should not be removed again during his life. (21)
.There it remained, until the Protestant revolution, which brought with it a new order of things, and the dissolution of
(23) Acts of 1652, chap. 2 ; 1674, chap. 16, and the statement of the peti- tion of the Mayor, Recorder, Aldermen, &c. of the city of St. Mary's, prefer- red to the Assembly at the session of October, 1694, which see in Upper House Proceedings, Liber FF 765 .- It appears, that 330,000 lbs. of tobacco were appropriated to defray the expense of its construction ; and 100,000 lbs. contributed by the city of St. Mary's. This building endured until the present year, when its remains were destroyed, and a church is now being erected on or near its site. Notwithstanding its antiquity, it was habitable, as I have been informed, even down to the present year, and had been used for many years before its entire destruction as a place of worship, Such a monu- ment of our colonial existence might have been spared all but the ravages of time. Its very desolation " would point e moral," and the recollections which it brings back, " adorn the history of a free people."
(24) These statements are sustained by the petition of the city of St. Mary's, in Upper House Proceedings, F F. 765, referred to in next note above ; and are not denied in the answer of the Lower House.
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all the feelings, which had hitherto retained the government at
Influence of the Protestant revo- lation upon its rank and privi-
this city, to the inconvenience of the province at large. It was the interest of the new government to destroy, as far as possible, the cherished recollections
which were associated with the departed proprietary power; and there was no object so entertwined with all these recollections, as this ancient city; consecrated by the landing of the colonists, endeared to the natives as the first home of their fathers, and exhibiting at every step the monuments of that gentle and liberal administration, which had called up a thriving colony out of the once trackless wilderness. The Catholics of the colony, dweit principally in that section of it ; and under the joint opera- tion of these causes, it had been distinguished during all the trou- bles consequent upon the civil wars in England, by its unshaken attachment to the proprietary. Without these considerations to prompt to the removal, the recollections and the attachments, which centre the feelings of a people in an ancient capital, would probably have contributed to preserve it as such ; until, by the denseness of the population, and the increasing facilities of travel- ling thereby afforded to the remote sections of the State, the objec- tion to its location would have been in a great degree obviated ; and the city of St. Mary's would at this day have been the seat of our State government. The excitement of the moment, made its claims to recollection, cogent reasons for its destruction ; and the public convenience came in as the sanction.
At the session of Assembly, m 1694, the removal of the go- vernment was resolved upon, and measures taken to carry it immediately into effect. The ancient city remonstrated, en- treated, offered, reminded ; but all to no purpose. Removal of the Antiquated as they are, her petition, and the reply of k. the lower house, are not without interest and amuse- ment. She experienced the fate which is common to all things mortal, in the days of adversity and decline. "They laughed at her calamities, and mocked when her fears came upon her." In the petition then presented by her mayor, aldermen, re- corder, common council, &c. &c. after dwelling upon her an- cient rights and privileges, sustained by their long enjoyment, and confirmed in the most solemn manner by the late proprietary, and upon the advantages of a site, well watered, and surrounded
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by a harbor where five hundred sail might ride securely at an- chor; they proposed to obviate all the objections, as to the want of accommodations and the difficulty of coming there, by keeping up, at their own expense, a coach or caravan, or both, to run daily during the session of the legislature and the provincial courts, between that city and the Patuxent, and weekly, at other times ; and at least six horses, with suitable furniture for all per- sons having occasion to ride post. The reply cf the lower house, is a specimen of the style, wit and temper of the day. Ridiculing the notion that they were bound by what the proprietary might have done, they remark : " As to the great expenditure of money in im- proving the place and country around, it is against the fact, for more money has been spent here by the rest of the province, than its inhabitants, and all the people for ten miles round are worth ; and yet, after sixty years experience, and almost a fourth of the province devoured by them, they still, like Pharoah's kine, remain as lean as at first ; and we are unwilling to add any more of our substance to such ill improvers. The place we propose, is a more central part ; and as well watered, and in every respect as com- modious as St. Mary's, which has hitherto served only to cast a blemish upon the rest of the province, in the eyes of all discern-' ing men, who, perceiving the meanness of the head, must judge proportionably of the body ; and as to the proposition for coaches, &c. the general welfare of the province ought to take the place of that sugar-plum, and of all the mayor's coaches, who as yet never had one." (25)
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